SFA chiefs have secured a new £60million TV deal. But, as a result of the package, none of Scotland’s competitive games between 2014-18 will be shown live on terrestrial TV.

Instead, all live European Championship and World Cup qualifiers will be shown on Sky with ITV holding the rights to a highlights package.

SFA chief executive Stewart Regan has revealed details of the deal, which has been struck as part of a centrally- negotiated package by UEFA.

Instead of each nation securing their own deal, UEFA have organised a contract on behalf of all 54 member states.

Scotland’s share of the pie is slightly more than the £53m that was negotiated by SFA brokers for the period 2010-14.

And there is still scope for the SFA to arrange fees with individual broadcasters for friendly matches and to sell off the rights to the Scottish Cup.

When this is done, the pot could reach £60m.

The guaranteed cash is a huge relief to the SFA at a time when the stock of the national game is poor and the Hampden bosses would not have been in a strong bargaining position with TV executives had they gone it alone.

However, the Tartan Army will regret the fact that neither BBC nor ITV have the rights to show live Euro or World Cup games.

Regan said: “It’s fantastic news for Scottish football and the Scottish FA.

“We now have confirmation that our centralised TV deal has been done and the rights have been sold to Sky for live matches and ITV for highlights for the period 2014 to 2018.

The guaranteed cash is a huge relief to the SFA at a time when the stock of the national game is poor

"That gives us the platform to start thinking about our strategy from 2014 because we have got the same minimum income that we have had from 2010 to 2014.

“The Scottish FA TV deal is a very good one. We have a bigger TV deal than Russia, for example.

“That was negotiated when the market was quite high, we have deliberately held the line to get the same value for 2014 to 2018 and we have done it and in addition we will be selling the Scottish Cup and other friendly matches separately so there’s another opportunity to make some additional income for the game, as well.

“We benefit from being part of the UK television market so Sky don’t negotiate Scotland as a separate region, they negotiate the UK and Ireland, as well.

“So what they have done is negotiated a deal to take all of the home nations games and ITV have the highlights so STV in Scotland will have the highlights. It’s great news for us from a stability point of view.”

On the issue of the BBC being cut out of the deal and having no live TV rights for Scotland, Regan admitted that the marketplace dictated the deal.

He said: “The BBC could buy individual friendlies. It depends on the Scottish Cup and the friendlies, the other package that is in the process of being sold.

“If the BBC pick up that, they might have some of the friendly matches.”